“Did you learn swordsmanship from Kwon Sa-yoon or something?”

As Geon-joo’s sword annihilated the twentieth specter that Ho-cheol had corralled, Ho-cheol, who had been watching his sword-wielding form with a curious eye, asked. It was a pure question, with no other intention behind it.

Whoosh!

Geon-joo twisted his body to the right, dodging an attack aimed at his head, and struck the chattering specter’s jaw with his elbow. He flicked his palm upward as if scooping it up, and the specter shot into the air. He shook his sore wrist.

“Why do you ask?”

“Well, can’t a guy ask? You’re so prickly, young man. Pointlessly wary.”

“Have you ever been kidnapped in your life?”

“…?”

“If you’d been kidnapped about three times, you wouldn’t be so quick to call someone wary.”

Geon-joo flashed a slight smiling-eye at the turning Ho-cheol and kicked the abdomen of an approaching specter. The specter, thinking he had let his guard down and seeing an opening, was sent flying endlessly back and plunged into the swamp. Ho-cheol was impressed. While displaying formidable physical skill, the way he moved, stepping only on the corpses of specters to avoid falling into the swamp, looked incredibly adept at body control. As if he were someone who had trained his body by repeating this kind of rough fight for a very long time.

‘He’s not of an age to have done that, so it’s strange.’

Ho-cheol muttered to himself, guessing Geon-joo’s apparent age. Judging by his looks, he seemed to have just become an adult, but there was an old saying that gloomy and vulgar-looking things like nine-tailed foxes often live much longer than they appear. Sa-yoon was like that, so the young man before him probably wasn’t much different. How did he find someone with such a similar impression? The atmosphere, the fighting style, and even that slight smile were uncannily alike.

Are they brothers or something?

As he was swallowing his question, another specter went flying. Contrary to his appearance, his strength was immense.

“You were clinging to him earlier using the excuse that you couldn’t see, but you’re fighting just fine now.”

He chattered, looking back and forth between the flying specter and Geon-joo, who was standing precariously on a specter’s corpse. The man with his eyes closed turned his head. Just the fact that he was keeping his eyes tightly shut because he couldn’t see, when overlapped with his movements in battle, made him feel strangely mystical. As he was muttering about how a monster had brought another monster, Geon-joo lightly tapped his shoulder with the pommel of his sword, telling him to focus.

“I came to support you because you looked like you were having a hard time with the specters, so stop playing around and get the rest of them. And, it wasn’t that I was clinging to him with the excuse that I couldn’t see; hyung wouldn’t let go of me even when I protested.”

From the moment Sa-yoon had caught him, Geon-joo had been insisting he could float on his own even without the frost platform. It was just that the man who couldn’t hear had ignored his intentions and acted on his own. He had almost foamed at the mouth when he was tossed to Mijeong’s black hand. The unpleasant memory made Geon-joo frown as he stared at Sa-yoon, who had by now driven the monster to the far end of the swamp. The powerful vibrations of his presence resonated through the space, reaching him time and again. His heart pounded as if in resonance with it.

He’s such a self-centered person.

Insolent, arrogant, inconsiderate, and unparalleled. Looking at him, he couldn’t help but think that the ‘I Alone am the Honored One’ disposition had found the wrong owner.

In Geon-joo’s eyes, Sa-yoon was the most tyrannical person under the heavens.

In terms of personality, and in terms of skill. Especially the former was exceptional.

Still, humans are animals of adaptation, and now his unreasonable attitude wasn’t as bad as before. It was quite bearable, quite tolerable. He dismissed the thought and swung his sword. Ho-cheol, who had been pushing the nearly defeated specters towards him for him to purify, couldn’t hold back and opened his mouth again.

“So, who taught you the sword?”

“I’m self-taught.”

“…Self-taught?”

It was a question laced with doubt. Geon-joo mulled over his memories.

“What did he say? ‘You think only life is about luck? Fighting is about luck and flow too!’”

“What?”

“And, ‘Dodge and ambush, ambush.’, ‘Think about what to do next.’, ‘Don’t think when you’re in a hurry. Just swing as your gut tells you.’ I think he gave me advice like that… If you count that as being taught, then I do have a teacher.”

Recalling the past, Geon-joo recited the words someone had said as he remembered them and let out a small laugh. It was a memory from over a year ago, but the baffled feeling he had at the time he received Sa-yoon’s advice-that-wasn’t-advice was still branded in his mind. Think, then don’t think. Parry the attack, then counterattack by ambushing. It was utter chaos. He was telling him to choose two completely different options, A and B, at the same time. Who could possibly pull that off?

But the man had done it.

Seeing Sa-yoon effortlessly perform what he had dismissed as nonsensical advice, Geon-joo had no choice but to revise his assessment of him. He hadn’t made that suggestion to mess with him, but because it was a technique he himself could perform without any trouble.

The day he realized that, his stomach had twisted so much. His pride was wounded, and he had starved for a whole day, just swinging his sword. From that day on, whenever he had to fight, he would picture Sa-yoon’s movements and chase his virtual form. He analyzed and dug deeper. He sketched out what posture would be most efficient, what line of movement would be most similar. And so, he finally reached a level where he could digest the movements Sa-yoon had wanted, but the distance between them would not close.

KRAD-D-DEUK!

“The head is a feint, you bastard!”

A heavy friction sound, unbefitting the light tone, was heard continuously. Just from the sound of Sa-yoon’s voice in battle, the clang of sword against sword, and the sounds of impact, Geon-joo could get a sense of the kind of fight he was in and turned his head. As the story was interrupted, Ho-cheol tilted his head and, a moment later, laughed heartily.

“I don’t know who taught you, but you’ve learned the sword well, lad! It’s not easy to master a myriad of sword styles at your age. You’ll probably be a case of the student surpassing the master.”¹

At his confident declaration and the hearty slaps on his back, Geon-joo, whose back was stinging, winced. After a brief rest, he kicked off a corpse again to go and finish off the specters and replied.

“Surpassing the master? It looks like I’ll never be able to become bluer.”

“Hmm?”

“But that’s not necessarily a bad thing.”

The last part was more of a mumble to himself.

He had built up his swordsmanship with the thought of beating Sa-yoon at least once, but now that he had become an S-rank, the gap between them felt even more pronounced. It was because even the minute details that could have been blurred by the difference in rank now came into view. Not all S-ranks were as fast as Sa-yoon. They couldn’t draw out maximum efficiency with such concise movements, nor could they display such chilling power with enchanting movements like a sword dance. The difference was so great that he no longer even had the thought of wanting to win.

That wasn’t just because he had realized the gap with Sa-yoon. A large part of why Geon-joo had abandoned half of his fighting spirit towards him was because he had heard his past from him.

How could he surpass a person who had lived such a life, who had endured so much?

Overtaking a person who had lived so precariously was meaningless. A sense of self-loathing would strike before any sense of satisfaction could.

Then what should I do?

Han Geon-joo had been contemplating this ever since he heard Sa-yoon’s story.

He had achieved all that he had intended. What circumstances Sa-yoon was carrying, why he needed him, the reason he hid the truth. He had found out everything he was curious about, and there was nothing more he wanted to uncover. No, it was more correct to say he didn’t want to dig up anything more.

Because he could see that the more he dug, the weaker Sa-yoon became.

The man he had admired was not that weak of a person. The man he had hated was not that precarious, and the man he had revered was not that timid. But the more he uncovered, the weaker, more precarious, and more timid Sa-yoon became. Like a turtle hiding in its shell to protect itself. But he was not one to miss what had once come into his sight. The vulnerability he had already spotted was plain to see, no matter what it was covered with.

The decisive factor was the sight of Sa-yoon almost completely collapsing due to the earring.

It was the first time Geon-joo had seen him tremble like that, or look so confused. Even when telling him his secret, he had spoken more calmly than anyone, so he never thought he would be shaken like someone falling off a cliff. That’s why Han Geon-joo no longer had any intention of digging up anything more about Sa-yoon.

It was a way to preserve his admiration for him, and also a way to preserve him. It was a compromise where no one would get hurt, and no one would suffer.

If that’s the case, what now?

If I’m not going to dig any deeper, and I have no intention of harming you.

What should I look towards and move forward?

The moment the goal he had been running towards was achieved, his mind went blank. That was why he had decided to stay by Sa-yoon’s side.

Because he felt that if he was by his side, he might discover something else, find another answer.

He was the one who had brought stimulation to his boring life, so it was an action born from the narrow thought that he would also be the one to give a second stimulation to him, who had become empty again after achieving the goal he had chased for over a year.

When he heard Sa-yoon’s nonsense about clearing an unconquered Gate together, he had thought he had made the wrong choice, but today he realized he hadn’t. As he slowly organized his thoughts, Geon-joo cut down the enemies before him one by one. The clearer his mind became and the closer he got to a conclusion, the more the number of enemies decreased. Finally, when he cut down the last specter in coordination with Ho-cheol, Geon-joo turned his head. He opened his eyes. His pupils, which had lost their focus, strangely looked directly at Sa-yoon.

I don’t want to hurt you anymore.

I have no desire to use you, either.

There’s a tiresome feeling, but I don’t want to leave your side.

As much as I remember you, I want you to remember me, too.

It was a kind of obsession for a mark. Since he was the one who had left a stimulus in his life, he too wanted to become some kind of stimulus in his life. That way, he wouldn’t think life was boring and try to die.

If I try, maybe a moment will come when you, too… will want to live.

He remembers the sight of Sa-yoon telling his past so candidly. He remembers the sight of him only laughing, not knowing how to cry. Mijeong’s story echoed in his ears.

‘The whole world was blaming him, so I decided I would be the one to believe in him.’

She had made that choice. Then what should he do?

Just then, the final clash between Sa-yoon and the swamp monster occurred.

KWAA-A-A-ANG!

The two beings collided violently, then were thrown apart with a space-rending roar. The swamp monster was pushed to the far side of the swamp, and Sa-yoon was sent flying in the opposite direction. The opposite of the swamp monster. That is, towards where the party was.

Geon-joo instinctively reached out his hands and caught Sa-yoon’s body, which had been thrown back by the impact.

“Ugh!”

The two of them rolled together over the corpses of the Death Knights and specters. Geon-joo, who had moved his body before he even had time to think in the instantaneous event, felt his mind clear.

I know what I have to do.

If you are a man so precarious you could collapse at any moment, that you constantly fill my sight.

I will not resist, but watch over you and support your back.

Then, when the moment you collapse comes, I will catch you. So that you can stand up again. I will catch you and pull you up.

And so, Han Geon-joo.

Wanted to make Sa-yoon live.

Geon-joo swallowed a groan and stood up, holding Sa-yoon. At that moment, a blue status window appeared before the eyes of the man who could not see.